


in a world uncertain, say you'll be my stone

by wafflesofdoom



Category: Emmerdale
Genre: Established Relationship, M/M, Robron Week 2018, True Love, wedding vows
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-31
Updated: 2018-03-31
Packaged: 2019-04-16 06:36:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,209
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14158926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wafflesofdoom/pseuds/wafflesofdoom
Summary: the one where aaron writes his wedding vows. inspired by stone, by alessia cara.written for day seven of robron week - jukebox.





	in a world uncertain, say you'll be my stone

The house felt unusually quiet, as Aaron settled himself at the kitchen table, cup of tea in hand. They’d decided to be traditional, this time around - Robert was staying at Diane’s, that evening, the two of them spending the night before their wedding apart - it was probably a bit ridiculous, really, considering how long they’d called each other husbands, how long they’d lived together as married (just, without the marriage certificate) but Robert had been determined they do it right, this time around.

They’d always consider their first wedding day an important day - to both of them, it was an anniversary. Despite all that had gone wrong in the months that had followed, that had been the day they’d decided to commit themselves to each other for life.

But they had decided to make it legal, do the registry office ceremony, and dinner with their families in their favourite restaurant in Hotten, and a party in the pub that evening, because they were Dingles after all.

It was so much more than a wedding day do-over, it was a reaffirmation of the promises they’d made more than a year ago.

Promises they were writing themselves.

Aaron had gotten better, at communicating his feelings - close to a year of counselling had changed the way he approached his feelings. His anger, his hurt, his happiness - he voiced every feeling he had, telling Robert how he felt, instead of bottling it up until he was ready to explode.

It had made them better, better in ways Aaron had never been sure they would be, and he was grateful for it - but standing up in front of a room full of friends and family, and telling everyone how, and why he loved Robert as much as he did, still felt daunting.

He could back out of it, he knew. Robert would happily do the bog standard, run of the mill wedding vows they did in every ceremony if it would ease Aaron’s nerves, if Aaron asked, but Aaron wanted it to be special.

This was the last time they were going to do this. After tomorrow, after their honeymoon, the rest of their lives would begin - school runs, and nappy changes, and boring work days, and everything else that was to come for them, holidays and fights about spending too much money, and kids.

Tomorrow, Aaron figured, would be one of the last days that was solely about them, about him and Robert. He didn’t anticipate every drop of romance draining out of their marriage after they made it legal, of course, but their plans for the future involved a house full of laughter, and noise, and the pitter patter of tiny feet, and very little peace and quiet for the two of them.

Picking up his pen, Aaron stared at the piece of paper in front of him, wondering where to begin.

How - how was he supposed to put into words how he felt about Robert?

* * *

 

He’d tried, over the years.

Love had been the first word. Aaron remembered the first time he said it, how his throat had felt as though it was closing up as he spoke, Robert standing in front of him in his wedding suit, ready to marry someone who wasn’t Aaron.

Aaron had loved, before Robert, he had. He’d loved Jackson, he’d loved Ed - he’d loved them both, and lost them both in different ways. Jackson, he’d never had a choice about. Ed? Well, it had been mutual, in the end, because sometimes love wasn’t enough to make something last.

But Robert - Robert had been different from the beginning, and that first ‘I love you’ had been terrifying, it had been Aaron putting his heart on the line and getting close to nothing in return, because thats how it had worked then.

It was rare, that Aaron thought about the affair these days.

Sure, it was when their relationship began, but it never did him well to dwell on the months of hurt, and pain, and loss. Sometimes Aaron wondered how something so wonderful had come out of something so twisted, and dark, and terrible - but it had, in the end.

No, the beginnings of their relationship wasn’t where Aaron was going to find his vows. It hadn’t been a happily ever after at first sight, and it was nothing but delusional to pretend as though Aaron had hoped for it to be a happy ending during those months.

No, he’d find his vows elsewhere.

Taking a sip of his tea, Aaron’s mind wandered to the trial, to everything Robert had done for him then.

It wasn’t a time in his life he liked to remember.

Aaron had talked about it enough. He’d sat with a counsellor, one specifically trained to deal with - well, to deal with kids who’d gone through what Aaron had, and they’d talked about it, and it was the sort of thing Aaron preferred to pack neatly away in a box in the corner of his mind, only to be opened during his Thursday sessions with Debra.

But he could think about the Robert he’d come to love during that time.

Aaron had always believed there was someone worth loving, underneath the confident facade Robert blustered through life wearing, but before the trial - and after - that was the first time he’d  _really_  seen that someone. Robert had been kind, and caring, and the sort of unwavering support he’d needed then.

Someone to believe him, and hold his hand, and let him cry all over their best shirt when everything got to be too much.

Aaron couldn’t help but brush his fingers against his lips.

He still remembered that first kiss, in the backroom - remembered the electric zing of Robert’s lips against his own, the way kissing Robert had felt like the first good decision he’d made in a long time.

That was their beginning, really.

Their beginning hadn’t been their first kiss at the side of the road, passionate and messy, indicative of everything Aaron’s life was about to become. No, their beginning had been that quiet first kiss in the backroom of his mum’s pub - it hadn’t be earth shattering, they hadn’t tipped the world on its axis as they kissed, but it had felt like coming home.

Home.

That’s what Robert was, wasn’t it?

His home. The person Aaron always wanted to be around, to be with. Those first few months together hadn’t been easy, but they’d still been everything Aaron had ever wanted, Robert’s hands in his, Robert’s body in Aaron’s bed, Robert having breakfast, and dinner, and lunch with him, the two of them getting to be wrapped up in each other in ways they’d never known.

Robert’s love, filling every inch of Aaron’s life, making a home for itself in all the darkest spaces of Aaron’s heart.

Aaron had taken so long to say it back, he knew that - but he’d been so reluctant to believe that it was for real, this time, that Robert was his. He’d wanted it for so long, and then he had it, and he’d been so afraid to lose it.

Their love had been fragile, then, open to being bruised, and damaged.

But Robert had put a ring on his finger, and he’d made it forever.

It hadn’t been perfect, not by a long shot, but Aaron wasn’t so sure he’d change any of it, good or bad - or utterly, completely terrible. In an ideal world, their relationship would have been perfect from the beginning, but they’d never done perfect very well, and - well, they wouldn’t been where they were now, if it wasn’t for the breakup.

It was strange to admit, really, but they’d needed that breakup, and they’d been too stupid in love to realise just how necessary it was, back in January. Promises of commitment, and happily ever after, had only ever pasted over the cracks in their relationship that had been splintering from the beginning.

You couldn’t build a lifetime on bad foundations.

But they could do it now.

God, they were better now, the kind of better that still shook Aaron to his core when he realised how stable, how good their relationship was. Everything he’d said to Robert, that night outside Keepers, it had been so true.

For all the bad in their relationship, there had always been more good.

Robert had proved himself, time and time again, and Aaron was grateful for it.

There had been a time in Aaron’s life where he’d been so convinced he’d never have love, not the real love Paddy had described, the love that felt so intense you feel as though you’d die without it.

But then Robert came along, and turned his world upside down.

Robert had loved him, had loved him in selfish ways, until he’d figured out how to give his love to Aaron freely, not asking for anything in return, just loving him like it was as easy as breathing. Robert had found his sister, had protected Liv with everything he had from the day she’d come into their lives, considering her as his own.

Robert had supported him through the worst parts of his life, the trial, prison, counselling. He hadn’t been perfect, but was anyone, really? For all his flaws, and bad decisions, Robert had never been anything but an unwavering support to him, committed to Aaron from the moment they’d had that second beginning in the backroom, all those years ago now.

They’d just figured out how to be happy, now - happy, and stable, and ready for a forever after.

Aaron couldn’t help but grin, hunching over the table as he began to scribble his vows.

He knew exactly what to say, now.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Weddings were a weird concept, Aaron decided. You had to stand up in front of your friends, and family, and declare your undying love for the person you loved - it felt like something better done in private, if he was being honest, but then again, he couldn’t deny it felt good to have everyone hear just how much Robert loved him, how committed Robert was to him.

(In a way, it felt like they were proving everyone who’d thought they were doomed to failure, wrong.)

“I wasn’t sure what to say, today,” Aaron admitted, glancing down at the notecards in his hands for a second, before he looked back at Robert. His gorgeous, gorgeous Robert, all blond hair and freckles, pale skin standing out against the deep navy blue of his wedding suit.

Matching ones, this time around.

“Trying to put how I feel about you into a words, it feels impossible,” Aaron continued. “You make me feel a kind of love I never thought I would get to experience for myself, Robert - the kind of love that completes you, the kind of love you feel so intensely, you might die without it. I feel that with you, and I feel it more and more every single day we spend together.”

Taking in a shaky breath, Aaron steadied his nerves, and kept speaking. “I don’t want to stand here and make you endless promises, today,” he admitted. “I don’t know whats to come for us, I don’t know how hard life is going to be for us. I don’t want to make promises I can’t guarantee I’ll keep.”

Robert’s soft smile, that encouraging look on his face was what made Aaron continue.

“You are my rock,” Aaron admitted. “Through every uncertainty life throws at me, you’re my rock. Every time my life has completely unravelled, you’ve been there, you’ve been - well, you’ve been my gravity, Robert. You keep me grounded, when I can’t do it myself.”

Aaron swallowed, his throat dry from speaking, from nerves. “I said I don’t want to make you any promises, today, but I will make you one - I promise I will stand by you forever, through good, and bad, through everything that comes our way, I will stand by you. I promise I’ll be your rock, your home. I promise you I will follow you wherever life takes us, and I’ll love you through it all - even when you’re driving me absolutely bloody mental.”

Robert laughed, his eyes glassy with tears as he listened to Aaron’s vows.

“You make me feel safe in a very uncertain world,” Aaron said, closing his vows tightly in his fist, not needing his notes now. “I’ll spend the rest of my life doing the same for you - encouraging you, loving you, making you feel safe, and at home. I figure - well, I figure as long as we do that, as long as we keep loving each other, everything else will come easy.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(And it would. Life - well, life for them was never going to be simple, but love would always hold them together, through good, and bad, and disappointments, and teenage tantrums, and a long, long life spent together.)

(But that was all years away. Now and then, it was about them, about Aaron and Robert, the couple - not the uncles, the sons, the fathers, the brothers, the grandfathers. No, it was about Aaron and Robert, two messy people who’d come together against all odds, and had fallen completely, impossibly, absolutely in love.)

(The end.)

(Or beginning, really.)


End file.
